by Ashley Shay
Suzie came skipping through the door with her fireflies in tow, Carly and Rosa right on her heels. The women moved toward Lucia, who had two steaming mugs of coffee waiting. Suzie skipped around the table, showing her jar to Dusty and Shane, who hadn’t seen the bugs yet.
“Sweetie,” Carly said, “you really should have left those bugs in your room while we ate.”
“What, we’re having bugs for breakfast?” Gabe’s voice filled the breakfast area. “I love bugs. Is that jar for me, Suzie?”
She shrieked with laughter and ran to hug Gabe as he swung her up for a kiss. She showed him the jar. “Nice bugs, but if you don’t mind, I’ll have some of Lucia’s burritos, kitten. Maybe we can have bugs next time?”
“They aren’t to eat, Uncle Gabe.”
He carried her to the table, plopped her in a chair, and sat down, looking at Tyler and Cougar over her head, but he aimed his words at her. “They aren’t? Then what do you have bugs captured in a jar for?”
“They’re fireflies,” Suzie explained solemnly. “They make light in my bedroom at night.”
“Oh, I see.” Gabe sounded utterly serious. “You’re going green, using natural light for your night-light.”
“I’m wearing green, but I’m not green,” Suzie protested. “Why did you say that, Uncle Gabe?”
Cougar snorted into his coffee cup, and Dusty said, “Enough about green bugs, I’m starving. Can we eat before all this gets cold?”
Lucia started passing the plates down the table so everyone could help themselves. As soon as she had the plates in motion, she wandered toward the door. Tyler thought it funny she couldn’t leave that cat alone for a minute. Ugly as he was, mean as he was, Lucia loved him something fierce.
“Something wrong, Lucia?” Cougar asked.
She jerked guiltily. “No, no. I was just trying to see what that bastardo Tomás is up to out there.”
“He’ll be fine. Sit down and eat with us,” Tyler ordered gently. “You deserve it after fixing this spread.”
Suzie swirled a long twist of bread through the syrup Lucia had warmed for her. She raised it up halfway to her mouth, and Gabe made a face at her across the table, rushing to get the first bite of his burrito before she could taste her dripping French toast.
Suzie’s giggle was cut short by Lucia’s bloodcurdling scream. She stood with her hands pressed against the glass panes. “Tomás! No, no, no!”
The occupants of the table exploded into action as the men jumped up, drawing weapons as they came out of their seats. Tyler saw Gabe drop the burrito down the front of his impossibly white shirt, leaving a greasy stain as he rushed to the door just behind him and Cougar.
On the flagstones, Tomás lay stiff, clutching a dead mouse in his paws. He had foam around his whiskers and an agonized look of pain on his face. Tyler glanced over his shoulder at the women. “Keep Suzie back.”
“Not my Tomásito,” Lucia cried, trying to push her way through the men. “My poor baby, pobre Tomásito. What is wrong? What has happened to him?”
Lucia wrung her hands together, unable to keep from looking at her poor Tomás sprawled headlong down the steps. She began to cry, and Tyler felt his heart break for the old woman. She’d loved the miserable ball of fur.
Tyler stared at the cat for a moment before the full ramification of the situation hit him. “Fuck!” He glanced at the women behind him. “Stay away from the food. He’s been poisoned. Lucia, tell me what the hell was going on in here this morning when I came in.”
“I saw un ratón… a mouse. That mouse.” Her voice caught as she tried to hold back her tears. She sniffed and straightened up. “It ran through the plates on the cupboard, and I yelled for Tomás to come help me. You came in just as he grabbed the mouse and I opened the door. I didn’t want to spoil breakfast for anyone, is good food, no? So I didn’t say nothing. I didn’t want you to think my kitchen is dirty. No está sucio. Not dirty.” She glanced out the door again. “Pobrecito.”
Tyler felt the panic welling up inside. It spiraled through his body until his heart began to hammer in his chest and he thought his head would burst. He grabbed Suzie and yanked her forward, peering down at her intently. Would he see any signs if she’d been poisoned? Fuck.
“Daddy! Let go. You’re hurting me!” She twisted, and he realized his hands were clenched on her shoulders.
He let her go, and she nearly fell down. Rosa caught her as Tyler looked from one person to another, feeling frantic and not sure what to do. “Did anyone eat anything? Rosa, wash Suzie’s hands right now. She touched food. Gabe, you touched food. Everyone, just get your damn hands washed now! Carly, you didn’t eat anything, did you?”
“Calm down, Ty,” Cougar said, gripping his shoulder. “Fast as that agent reacted, we’d know by now if any of us were poisoned.” He glanced at the group as Tyler fell back against the counter. Thank God for Cougar. “Everyone should wash their hands, twice, three times, and we need to get rid of all the food in the house.” He tapped his earbud and requested a security detail be dispatched immediately to sweep the grounds. “I’ll send a couple of guys to pick up breakfast for everyone. In the meantime, let’s hear what Gabe has to say and send Tomás and the mouse for analysis.”
Carly stepped into the midst of the men. “Shame on you. Are any of you thinking of Lucia?” She put her arms gently around the crying old woman and led her toward the swinging door. Rosa and Suzie followed behind her. “They will find out who hurt Tomás, and they’ll make him pay, Lucia. He was very brave to save our lives like that.”
“Sí,” Lucia said with a sob, “era muy valeroso.”
Tyler listened to the women’s hushed voices and Lucia’s muffled sobs, and he suddenly felt inadequate to the task of protecting his family. If it hadn’t been for that damn miserable old cat, they might have all been dead, despite the elaborate security systems, the guards, and the fortune he’d spent to buy experts and protection. He knew Cougar must be ready to explode inside. He would take this assault as a personal failure on his part.
“Not your fault, buddy.” Tyler clapped Cougar on the shoulder. “There’s only so fucking much we can do. Until we find out who this guy is, our hands are pretty much tied.”
“I might be able to help with that,” Gabe said quietly, watching as a security guard bagged Tomás and the mouse to take back to the lab.
The gloved Tomcat guard discreetly dropped Tomás into a specimen bag with as much dignity as he could muster. “I’m on this, sir. If our lab can’t fully break down the ingredients, we’ll fly the remains to the project lab in LA and request overnight analysis.”
“Whatever it takes,” Tyler agreed.
* * * *
In the kitchen, the men huddled around the table with another pot of coffee. They had dumped everything out and brewed a fresh pot from an unopened can. After checking on the women, they settled down to business.
“I don’t know how to say this,” Gabe started, and Cougar gave an impatient growl.
“Why don’t you just fucking say whatever it is you’ve been hiding from us? That would be a start.”
“Cougar,” Tyler warned.
“Let him talk,” Dusty said, defending his twin. “I want to know what’s going on too. No one has breached this ranch since Cougar took over the security. Gabe owes us an explanation.”
Gabe held up his hands in surrender. “I think the same man, the same shifter, that killed Jillian is after Carly, and—”
Cougar nearly exploded out of his chair. “Jesus Christ! And you didn’t think you should tell us this!”
Dusty yanked on his arm and said quietly, “Let him finish, Cougar.”
“The pattern fits,” Gabe said.
“The pattern fits,” Cougar mocked with a sneer.
“It takes a while to see a pattern, let alone analyze it. You know that, Cougar. After as much evidence as I could muster, and as many witnesses as I could interrogate—and believe me there aren’t many—I’ve come to the conc
lusion it looks like Viper.”
Tyler shut his eyes and ran his hands through his hair in frustration. “Viper. I should have put it together before now.”
“Viper?” Cougar dropped back to his seat, and his voice was as flat as his stare. “You mean that mythical assassin you two have spent your whole careers chasing?”
“Let him finish,” Tyler said.
But Cougar apparently had no such plan. He leaned forward. “You spent a fucking decade chasing your tails while you searched for some phantom. And for all your patterns and analysis and bullshit evidence, you found nothing except trouble. Did you lead that fucking monster back to Cattail? To our mate? Is that what happened to Jillian? She was collateral damage on one of your bullshit assignments?”
Tyler looked stricken. “Cougar, I didn’t know. We don’t even know if that’s what happened for certain. We’re grasping at straws here, okay?”
* * * *
Rosa strained to listen to their conversation from the hallway. Her eyes brimmed with tears. Viper. She’d heard that used as a name for her brother by the sycophants that followed him everywhere. She’d thought it some stupid nickname given to him by the Serpent Society, maybe even a code name for some of the more nefarious activities the Society performed. Had the whole name been a joke at the expense of the federal authorities searching for him? Could he really have been the monster that killed her best friend? A sickness roiled in her belly, and she knew without a doubt he had killed Jillian, but it hadn’t been because Tyler and Gabe were pursuing him. It had been because of her.
She clamped a hand over her mouth to keep from being sick. The twisted son of a bitch had killed Jillian so she’d have no one and would be forced to return to the Serpent Society to join him as a player in the family business. Now he’d crossed paths with Carly and would kill her too. He’d tried to kill her this morning. He’d tried to kill them all. As if she could read his mind, Rosa thought she understood her brother’s motives at last. If he killed everyone and everything that mattered to her, she’d have no choice but to seek sanctuary within her own community.
Rosa managed to stifle a moan. What should she do? What could she do?
“You okay, ma’am?” Tomcat 6 asked with concern.
She hadn’t heard him approach. Unable to speak for the moment, she nodded mutely.
“We’ll catch this bastard.” Tomcat 6’s eyes glittered with restrained emotion. He was geared for a kill, and Rosa knew nothing short of bloodshed would satisfy the panther inside him. “When we do, he’s going to be one sorry asshole.”
* * * *
Dusty stood up from the table, looking at no one in particular. “I’ve heard enough. I’m going out with the Tomcats to check the perimeter.” He grabbed his hat from the back of the chair, jamming it on his head. “I’ll grab something to eat later. Don’t expect me back for breakfast.”
“Me either.” Shane followed his brother out the door. “Wait up, bro.”
Dusty didn’t speak until they got out of the house. “So what do you think? Is this fucking snake the problem?”
“Gotta be something we’re missing, Dusty. Would an assassin of that caliber keep coming? I mean, Tyler and Gabe can’t be the only law enforcement officers on his tail. Why’d he choose to bait and torment them over all the others?”
Dusty hesitated and turned to face Shane. His brother was right. They were missing something in the big picture. “Hell if I know, Shane. Maybe there’s other stuff they aren’t telling us. You know how the two of them are.”
“I just feel like if we could get the whole picture in our heads we could figure this out.” Shane looked out over the wide expanse of Cattail. “I don’t want to lose another mate, especially not Carly.”
They continued to walk, eating the distance of the lawn quickly. Dusty felt something cold and calculating harden within him. He loved his brother, his alpha, but he wasn’t going to let Tyler keep them out of the loop this time. They needed to know what they were dealing with. If they’d known about Viper before Jillian, they might have been able to save her. “We aren’t going to lose another mate, Shane.”
“You can’t challenge Tyler. You know that.”
“Who said anything about challenge?” Dusty growled. “I’m just saying we’ve got a right to know what he knows. I’ll call a council meeting if I have to.”
Shane froze on the path. When Dusty paused and glanced over his shoulder, Shane was looking at Dusty like he’d lost his mind. Dusty understood the thought behind that look. Convening the council was tantamount to calling the alpha’s decisions or ethics into question. He didn’t know a more ethical man than Tyler, but years in the government had made him less than forthcoming. Tyler could keep a secret tighter than a nun could cross her legs. The problem with that was secrecy and subterfuge had never been employed in ruling Catamount and had never been a Lucas trait. Their father had ruled with an iron fist, but he’d never withheld his reasons for doing so.
His brother thrust out his arm and grabbed Dusty’s shoulder in a steely grip. Dusty wasn’t even sure Shane knew what he’d done. Dusty winced against the sudden violent grip, but Shane never seemed to notice. His glance slid up and down the path, and his voice was low, practically vibrating with abhorrence. “You can’t mean that.”
“I do mean it,” Dusty said, “and you can’t say I’m not justified. There are lives at stake. We have proof of that.”
“A dead cat,” Shane reminded him.
“A poisoned cat.” When Dusty saw a bit of doubt creep into Shane’s eyes, he pushed on. “Tyler himself said it looked like poison. Tomcat 8 confirmed it when he bagged the body. I don’t need a lab to tell me what I already know.”
Shane ran a hand over his jaw. Dusty heard the rasp of his beard. “That’s not Tyler’s fault.”
“Maybe not directly…”
“Maybe not at all,” Shane said firmly.
Dusty pulled his hat farther down on his head. He couldn’t stand that accusatory look in his brother’s eyes. Shane stared at him like he’d already betrayed their alpha. Damn, that’s the last thing he wanted to do, but what the fuck were they supposed to do now?
“Jeez, Dusty, think about what you’re saying here.” He dipped down to peer under the shadow of Dusty’s hat. “Please. That’s all I ask. Just think about it some more.”
Dusty shoved his hands in his pockets and started to walk. “Sure. Okay.”
They’d almost reached the stables when Shane broke the silence.
“When we get the test results…when we have more information, we’ll talk to Cougar.” Dusty paused and turned to look at his brother. Shane stared straight at the barn, his jaw clenched, forcing the words through gritted teeth. “If the two of you agree there’s more about this we need to know…” Dusty studied him expectantly, but what Shane said shocked the hell out of him. “If you both agree there’s more, then as beta, I’ll convene the council.”
He glanced up at Dusty, and the look in his eyes—that horrible look of betrayal—was back. Only this time it had reflected inward. Dusty hated to see it and hated more that he’d been responsible for putting it there.
“Fair enough?” Shane asked.
Dusty nodded. “Fair enough.”
No one was around the stable. David was probably out with the Tomcats since he was a hell of a natural tracker. He could pick up things the most sophisticated equipment could overlook.
“Did you plan to saddle up?” Shane asked. “Shift?”
“Nope, I’m taking the four-wheeler this time. I need to cover ground fast. Something about Cotton Creek keeps pulling me back up there.”
“Then let’s ride.”
* * * *
Cougar paced in his office. They didn’t need him outside. Hell, there were enough men on the grounds that, even with caution, every trace of evidence had probably been totally obliterated by now. He had a good team, but there was only so much to be done in circumstances like this.
He couldn’
t sit still, but he didn’t want to be around anyone, especially not Gabe and Tyler, right now. He didn’t trust himself not to deck one of them for leaving him out of the loop. If he’d known Viper was involved, he’d have taken other precautions, different precautions, something. Hell, he didn’t know. He had to acknowledge none of that would have made much difference, but at least he’d have felt like he was doing something, instead of twiddling his thumbs and waiting for trouble to find them.
As he passed the window, he caught a glimpse of Gabe and Carly at the pool, swinging Suzie between them out over the water. The cub was laughing delightedly and kicking her feet in anticipation of being dropped into the pool. At least she hadn’t been too traumatized by the whole mess. But poor Lucia was another matter. The old woman would mourn that cat for weeks.
Cougar rubbed a weary hand over his face watching as Gabe and Carly nodded at one another and let go of the kitten. Suzie Q cannonballed into the water, and the two adults held their stares as she shrieked her delight and splashed into the clean, cool water.
So it’s Gabe’s turn now. One by one, the alpha mate was claiming her men, making the pride strong though sex, loyalty, and love. She hadn’t tried to mate with him yet. Not that he’d given her much chance to approach him. Still, it stung a little that she was outside laughing with Gabe when he desperately needed to forget, for a little while, that he was responsible for keeping them all alive and safe, and he’d almost failed. Again.
Oh, the hell with hiding out in his office. He needed to have a heart-to-heart with Tyler.
Chapter Eighteen
At the knock, Tyler looked up from the phone and motioned Cougar to come inside when he poked his head through the door. He rubbed the bridge of his nose and wondered why serpents always gave him such a fucking headache. Even Rosa gave him headaches. They were notoriously impossible to deal with. The serpent shifter he’d hired to help with security at the branch was no different.
